By India McCarty
Pro golfer Rory McIlroy gave his parents a heartfelt thank you following his second Masters win.
“Mom and Dad, I owe everything to you,” he said during his post-win Green Jacket Ceremony speech. “You’re the most wonderful parents. And if I can be half the parent to [daughter] Poppy as you were to me, then I know I’ve done a good job. Thank you.”
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McIlroy has previously praised his parents for supporting his dreams of playing professional golf.
“I was always fixated with it for a very long time from a very young age, and it all started as my dad’s whole side of the family were golfers and we grew up very close to the golf course. My dad was a good amateur player, a scratch golfer, so it just all stemmed from there,” he said in a 2022 interview with The Open.
McIlroy continued, “I was never pushed into it in any way. If anything it was the other way around. I had to drag my dad out to the golf course, so I was never pushed into playing golf. It was always my ambition, my dream, I had to drag my dad out to the golf course to play, so it was pure, pure joy and pure passion for me.”
The pro golfer also thanked his wife Erica and daughter Poppy in his speech, saying, “First and foremost my wife and daughter Erica and Poppy, they have to put up with me at home and trust me sometimes that’s a tough thing to do. But they have been my biggest supporters.”
McIlroy joked, “This has definitely turned into Poppy’s favorite week of the year. I don’t know if it’s because of the Par Three tournament or it’s the all-you-can-eat ice cream in the player services building.”
While speaking to reporters at this year’s Masters, the golfer gushed about his daughter — “She is the most unbelievably polite and respectful and well-behaved little girl. To give her a life that I could only dream about, that’s been the coolest thing.”
In a 2020 interview, McIlroy shared how fatherhood put things into perspective for him, explaining, “[My career] matters to me and I care about it very much, but at the same time, it makes the hard days a little easier to get over, right.”
“When I say it’s not the be-all and end-all, it’s a major championship and I’ve grown up my whole life dreaming of winning these tournaments, and that’s not going to change, but if it doesn’t quite happen, I can live with that and go home and be very happy and leave what’s happened at the golf course at the golf course,” he concluded.
For McIlroy, the love and support of his family is more important than the glory of professional success.
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